The Hostility of Hanno: An Outlaw Chronicles short story by Angus Donald Page A

knights and men-at-arms; crossbowmen, too – yes, two thousand men in all, maybe
     more.’
    I blinked at him. ‘Two thousand?’
    ‘I think so,’ said Hanno. ‘But they will never expect us. We can get into the castle without much difficulty, if they will
     open the gate to us. After that …’ He shrugged.
    I had been told that the besieged garrison of Verneuil numbered just over a hundred men, and I looked at my own little command,
     my puny war-band, wrapping themselves in their thick green cloaks and bedding down for the night around me, and thought to
     myself –
ten to one. Not good.
But I said nothing, trying to appear as if I had absolute confidence in the success of our mission.
    ‘Then we’d better kill as many Frenchmen as possible on the way in,’ I said, achieving a shaky nonchalance. ‘I think we will
     play this one straight as an arrow; we’ll go in early tomorrow morning, kill the picquets, ride hard, cut through the enemy
     lines and proceed directly up to the castle’s front gate. Hard and fast. Understood?’
    There were murmurs of agreement.
    ‘Fine. Now, let’s sleep. But might I have a word with you, Owain? I need your bow to get a message into the castle. I need
     to make damn sure they open the gates to us.’
    The French sentry was alert: from his position on a small rise perhaps half a mile outside Verneuil he saw our column approaching
     slowly from the south-west. Though he had been reclining on the grassy ridge, taking his ease, he leapt to his feet the moment
     he spotted us emerging from a small wood a mile away and shouted something inaudible over his shoulder. As we walked our horses
     up the slight slope, affecting the tired boredom of men at the end of a long and uneventful journey, two horsemen in bright
     mail, with gaudy pennants on their lances, cantered down the slope to meet us.
    With Hanno at my side, I spurred forward to greet the two knights, leaving the column behind me with strict instructions to
     continue their pose as exhausted travellers until I gave the signal. When we were twenty yards from the two strangers, the
     foremost one called loudly, angrily in French for us to halt. And Hanno and I reined in and sat obediently staring at the
     two heavily armed men.
    ‘Who are you?’ shouted the first knight in French. ‘What is your name and what business have you here?’
    ‘I am the Chevalier Henri d’Alle,’ I said in the same language. For some reason the only false name I could think of was my
     father’s; but then he had been much on my mind of late. ‘I serve Geoffrey, Count of the Perche,’ I continued, ‘and my men
     and I are riding to join my master’s liege lord, King Philip of France, at Verneuil.’
    My answer seemed to calm the knight. He glanced at my boar-shield and nodded to himself; it was common knowledge that Count
     Geoffrey had revoked his proper allegiance to King Richard and come over to King Philip’s side. It was also known that, despite
     pleas from King Philip for him to join the fight in Normandy, Geoffrey had refused his blandishments and had stubbornly remained
     in his fortress of Chateâudun fifty miles to the south of Verneuil. It was a plausible enough story, although it would not
     bear too close a questioning. The knight nodded and beckoned us to approach. ‘We will escort you to the King,’ he said in
     a more friendly tone.
    Signalling to the company to come forward, I walked my horse over to the two knights. The four of us began to climb the gentle
     slope up to the ridgeline together. The knight beside me, who had politely introduced himself as Raymond de St Geneviève,
     started to question me about recent events in the Perche, which I answered only in monosyllabic grunts – I knew almost nothing
     of the county bar that it was famous for its horses and reputed to be full of hills and valleys and dark haunted forests.
     As we reached the top of the rise, the knight was frowning at my surly answers to his